Republican MP confirms hearings

NEW YORK - The chairman-designate of the House of Representatives Committee on Homeland Security had confirmed that he will hold hearings on the radicalisation of the American Muslim community. In an op-ed piece in Newsday, Congressman Peter King, a Republican, said such hearings are critical because al-Qaeda is recruiting Muslims living legally in the US home-grown terrorists who have managed to stay under the anti-terror radar screen. King also told news media interviews that the Muslim community does not cooperate with law enforcement to anywhere near the extent that they should. With al-Qaeda trying to recruit from within their community its important that they cooperate, King was quoted as saying. A spokesman for the Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations said he fears Kings hearings will become an anti-Muslim witch-hunt. Were concerned that itll become a new McCarthy-type hearing, said the spokesman, Ibrahim Hooper. Hooper said members of the Muslim community helped foil several recent terrorist plots by cooperating with law enforcement. And he questioned Kings assertion that law-enforcement officials have complained about a lack of cooperation from Muslim leaders. Which officials are these? he asked. Which leaders are not cooperating? King said in the Newsday piece that prior to the 2001 terrorist attacks, he had a close relationship with the Muslim community. I attended the Islamic Centre of Long Island in Westbury on a regular basis, visited socially with local Muslim leaders, had Muslim students intern in my office, and advocated for Pakistans position against India in Kashmir, he was quoted as saying. But after the attacks, King said, he was outraged that some Muslim leaders were insisting there was no evidence that al-Qaeda was responsible for the attacks even saying it could have been the CIA, the FBI or the Zionists Habeeb Ahmed, the chairman of the board of the Islamic centre, confirmed that King was formerly a frequent visitor there. He was very close to the Muslim community, Ahmed said. He never really explained to us what really happened. Ahmed said he hopes that if King holds hearings he invites Muslims to participate and not just the so-called Muslim experts who have their own agenda. King, 66, is in line to chair the Homeland Security Committee with the Republican takeover of the House. He vowed do all he can to break down the wall of political correctness and drive the public debate on Islamic radicalisation. King said he knows of imams instructing members of their mosques not to cooperate with law enforcement officials investigating the recruiting of young men in their mosques as suicide bombers. We need to find the reasons for this alienation.